CompTIA: Nearly 60 Percent of Techies on Job Hunt

More than half of IT professionals are open to new employment opportunities, according to new research from technology industry association CompTIA. Out of about 1,000 respondents to the organization’s survey, 58 percent are looking for new jobs, and four out of five tech workers seeking new openings said their search is somewhat or very active.

However, Neill Hopkins, vice president of skills development, CompTIA, said this wasn’t necessarily indicative of an uncompromising resolve on the part of these workers to leave their organization but rather to change their current circumstances.

“It’s difficult to get detailed information out of a research project such as this,” Hopkins said. “If you read between the lines of what respondents are telling us, they’re not overly satisfied with their current roles and responsibilities in the organizations they work for — it wasn’t saying, ‘Look out! Six out of 10 of your IT professionals are currently looking for another job elsewhere.’

“I think they’re really saying, ‘I’m dissatisfied with my lot. I could look for some more help from my employer, I could look for other work within my organization or I could look for work outside of my organization.’”

Still, there is one fairly evident take-away in this study for employers, Hopkins said.

“I think the red flag to organizations out there with IT employees is that unless you’re doing a good job with taking care of your IT professionals, they could be very dissatisfied with their lot in life,” he said. “Two-thirds said there are no opportunities for advancement in their current job. Most of these IT workers today find themselves doing many jobs and in many roles. It’s not getting easier — it’s getting more complicated. Despite what vendors will tell you, it’s not an easy job to make all this stuff work together in a structural environment effectively in most organizations.”

So what should employers do to “take care of” their IT pros? Well, they can start by including them in important decisions that have an impact on the business, especially where technology is concerned. Also, organizations should make sure they provide advancement opportunities to techies.

“I think you’ve got to keep them engaged,” Hopkins said. “I’m not sure they sit down with their IT professionals to discuss their careers. They oftentimes keep these guys in their backrooms, looking after banks of servers, and say, ‘Make sure it’s up,’ and if it’s not up, then they’re in trouble. IT is becoming such a critical part of a successful business, but I think they’re often left out of the decision-making process. They’re often just told to fix it or throw it over the wall and hope it works. Organizations would be better off including them in these discussions and mapping out careers for them.”